I shook my head. Leo, who had climbed onto the pile of blankets beside me, rearranged himself with a happy sigh.
'Actually,' Eve said, 'I think Leo saved your life.'
I raised my eyebrows, looked at the dog.
'Besides finding you, I mean. When I ran back here for the brandy, I covered you with my slicker and told him to get under it and stay with you until I came back. I think his being there kept you just warm enough to stay conscious. Then I gave you brandy and told you you'd die if you didn't get up and come with me.' She smiled again. 'And you told me to go to hell.
'But you got up. It took a couple of tries. I was afraid that you couldn't. It was obvious you were hurt. I was trying to think what to do if you really couldn't walk, but you did get up, and you leaned on me and we came here.'
She made that last part sound easy.
When shed come through the door her cheeks had been glowing from the wind, but as wed talked the color had faded, and I saw now that her eyes were dark-ringed and her skin was patchy and dull.
'You haven't slept,' I said.
She shrugged, finished her coffee. Over her shoulder, framed in the squares of the window, leafless branches danced in a gusting wind.
'Thanks,' I said. It was dust when it should have been diamonds, but when I said it she lifted her eyes to mine and smiled.
She stood, got the coffeepot from the stove, refilled our mugs. Small, everyday blessings. I drank.
'Why were you there?' she asked. 'Why did you come back? Who called me?'
I passed my hand over my eyes. Something was in the back of my brain, but it was darkness and noise. 'I don't know.'
I drank more coffee. 'I remember leaving after dinner, driving away. No, wait—' The coffee was nudging something forward, like an indulgent aunt with a shy child whose turn it was to recite. 'Light. I wanted to reach the light.' That seemed right, but I didn't know what it meant.
'Where?'
I pulled out another cigarette, dropped the pack back in the bowl. I lit another match. With the flare came a sudden burst of memory. 'Your studio. In your studio. There were lights down there as I came around the curve, so I parked the car and went down to look.'
'Lights in my studio? Last night? What—who was there?'
I reached, but there was nothing. 'I don't know. I came close, but I don't think I got there.' A dark figure, a shadow in the shadows. 'Someone was waiting. He hit me from behind. I didn't pee him.'
'Someone was waiting for you? Someone wanted to kill you?' Her voice might have cracked, but if it did she got it back under control fast.
'No. They couldn't have known I'd come, couldn't have even known I'd see the light. And I would've been easy to kill, once I was down. I was even carrying a gun, if he didn't want to use his own.'
'But you could have died. But they didn't want you to, or they wouldn't have called here. I don't understand. Why do that to you, and then call me?'
I thought about that. 'Something was going on that someone didn't want me to know about, or screw up. But there's been one death already; maybe they thought another would call down more heat than they were ready to take. I suppose they could have ditched my body where it wouldn't be found'—Eve cradled her coffee as though her hands were suddenly cold—'but I'm too high-profile right now to just disappear. Brinkman would love nothing better than for me to just turn around and go back to the city, but he knows I won't, so if I disappeared he and MacGregor would know something was up. No, as long as they make sure I don't know what the hell's going on, I must be less trouble alive than dead. So they got me out of the way, got their business done, and called you.'
'Got their business done. In my studio.' Eve's mouth was drawn into a thin line.
I picked up the gun again and did what I hadn't done before: broke it open, emptied it, tested the action. It worked. It always worked, rain, snow, sleet, or gloom of night. The mail used to be like that, too.
I reloaded the gun, put it down, went and got my socks and boots. The boots were tight and not quite dry, the laces squeaking a little through the eyeletted holes.
'What are you going to do?' Eve asked me.
'I'm going to have a look around, see if I can figure out what it is I'm not supposed to know.'
'Are you sure you're all right?'
'I'm fine.' I buttoned my shirt. I slipped my holster on, moved the strap around on my left shoulder searching for a comfortable, or at least bearable, way to wear it. There wasn't one. I took it off.
Leo had jumped off the couch as soon as I stood; now he was sitting by the door, brushing the floor with his tail. Suddenly his back bristled. He spun to face the door, started to bark.
'Someone's coming,' Eve said.
She opened the inner door, stepped through the vestibule, Leo barking furiously beside her. I followed her out onto the porch, in time to see the sheriff's car roll to a stop in the driveway in front of the house.
Brinkman unfolded his long, booted legs from the car's passenger-side door. The heavy deputy got out the other side. Eve told Leo to stay on the porch with us and he did, growling deep in his throat.
Brinkman's face was unreadable as he stood at the bottom of the porch steps looking up. 'Well,' he finally said. 'You sure do turn up in the strangest places, city boy.'
